Brewer Park and an Alexloop

The wx was just fantastic this am and when I was talking with VA3PCJ on the phone we decided that it would be great time to let our radios play in the park…  About one hour later we were setting up at Brewer Park (across from Carleton University) in Ottawa South…

View Larger Map

We were set up at the south end of the complex near the pond

I brought my FT 817 and Jose brought his KX3… 

The antennas of choice for Jose was the S9 43 foot vertical for the KX3 (attached to the trailer hitch of his jeep) and I borrowed the ALEXLOOP that Jose picked up just before his trip to CX7Land…

This morning was the first time I have had a chance to use the Alexloop and I was impressed…  It installed with no effort what so ever and it took me a few minutes to get the tuning figured and and then I was making my first contacts…

The honour of contact 1 went to NU6L (Joe in Valley Center CA)  the contact was made on 20m ssb and according to QRZ.com it was a distance of approx 2330 miles.

The 2nd contact was with AC0ML (Ken in Marshfield MO).  It was also on 20m ssb and QRZ says the distance was approx 1050 miles…

The 3rd contact was with N8AD (Len in Erie PA)  This contact was made on 40m ssb and according to QRZ it was about 325 miles from the park to his place.  As Len does do some remote work I’m not sure where he was…  but his radio is in Erie…

The last contact (last but not least) was with VA3NP (Roy in Welland ON).  Roy was the NCS for the TP Net on 40m ssb.  This was my short contact of the day at approx 245 miles…

Now as you know my normal antenna of choice for daytime ops is my Par End Fed and the distances covered today were no better or worse than I would expect if I was operating with the Par.  Remember the antenna of the day was the Alex Loop on a camera tripod…  So nothing rare or exotic but it was sure easy to set up and operate.  I found it easy to tune (after the first time) and the contacts were easy to make…

I heard them….  I called them…  and they answered… 

It was a simple as that…  5w and a loop antenna about 2 feet above ground (ok mounted on a 2 foot high tripod) and it was easy to use….  Seeing that I still have to drink the koolaid and get a KX3… the Alexloop will not be heading to my backpack soon but I think it will be there in the future…  Just not the near future…

In the meantime get out there and play some radio…

73bob

Every day can be QRPTTP

First question is most likely QRPTTP???? 

What the heck is QRPTTP????

Simple… QRPTTP stands for:

QRP to the Park!!!

Not to be confused with Summits on the Air or SOTA as you might call it…  This fantastic part of our hobby needs someone like myself (overweight, old and in bad shape) usually to climb a large hill…

… and as I get older and heavier proving I am more out of shape than I thought this part of our hobby gets harder for me with every passing day…

The Islands on the Air is for the most part out of my reach as Ontario has no salt water islands to play with and the cost in time and money to travel to one that has salt water surrounding it greatly detract from my participation.  Lets see now…  do I want to buy a new KX3 or do I want to activate a SOTA Island????  My budget is limited so I’ll invest in the radio thank you…

there is the CISA (Canadian Islands Awards Program) and I have activated Maple Island and Bate Island but its just not the same…

But every day can be QRPTTP day….

Set up at the Softball Diamond “Dugout” at Hutton Park Ottawa when there was no game going on.

All you need to do is get your sorry butt over to a neighborhood park and most of us live close to some sort of field where the City keeps the grass short and provides a few picnic tables…  These greenspaces also normally have a couple of antenna supports (the locals call them trees…) and set up your antenna along with your radio and make some contacts…

Weston Park is only a 15 minute walk from my front door and I have to pass a Starbucks to get to it… and as you can see from the below picture the park is open all year round as well

If you live in the City (like I do) I am willing to bet that you will have a lower noise floor in the park and also you will have the ability to stretch out a better antenna than the compromise vertical you normally operate with at home….  Not all of us are lucky enough to have an extra large lot that allows an 80m dipole or a 48 foot tower with a beam on it….

Vincent Massey Park has lots of room to put up wire…

Now some would say the exotic DXPeditions have a “wow” factor to them and they would be right.  But speaking as an operator its just as much fun being outside in the sun… working the world with a wire antenna…  and to be honest the DX does not really care where you are operating from… They just want you in the log…

My daughter Erika and myself enjoying the sunshine and warmth at Britannia Park with the Ottawa Amateur Radio Club

And Mooneys Bay Beach before it opens is a peaceful and quiet location…

The views can be as great as the operating…

So the next time you have a chance take your radio outside for some fresh air…  Guaranteed you will not regret it

73bob

Getting ready for QRP to the Field

Last night (after supper) Michel VE3EMB and myself headed out to do a “recon” of the site we were planning to operate from (along with Martin VA3SIE) this Saturday for the QRP to the Field contest….

In keeping the “HAPPY TRAILS” theme of this years event we had decided to operate from one of the Rideau Canal Lock Stations here in Ottawa as it fit the contest organisers defination of a “Trail”…

Heres the view from the picnic table looking across the Canal to Carleton University

We were fortunate enough to find a location with a bit of altitude, along with a picnic table and more than a few trees to string antennas from.  The best part is that its also off the main bike paths that are in the area so interuptions should be kept to a minimum…

One of the two (of many) antenna supports

Looking the other way

As you can see from the above pictures…  It should be a good location to operate from…

Although according to the Weather Network…  the weather guess is supposed to be excellent so things are looking up.  The plan is to arrive and be on the air for 11am EDST and operate till around 4pm EDST… Perhaps longer if the batteries hold out and we are still having fun…

However as its better to be safe than sorry…  We do have a covered operating area to play from if things get damp…  about 1km south of where we plan to operate from so….

Above- my FT 817

Below- Stock Photo of the KX3

I will be bringing my FT 817 and my antenna of the day will be my Par End Fed antenna….  Both Martin and Michel both have KX3s so I am expecting to get a good look at them in action…  I’m getting closer to “drinking the Kool Aid ” and so a good Elecraft performance today could finally tip the scales…

Above- PAR End Fed QRP (10-20-40m) Antenna

More on this after the event…

Hope to hear you on the air on Saturday…

73bob

REQUIRED READING

Thanks to a link tweeted by @VE3MPG  I found this piece.  I never would of found it otherwise but I feel it is worth sharing with you…

Please take the time to check this out….

http://w3atb.com/66-boston-marathon-2013-bombs-carnage-and-amateur-radio-operators

And hope you enjoy it as much as I did…

Thanks to VE3MPG for bringing it to my attention and a big thanks to Tim Carter, W3ATB for being there to assist the community and also this very fine blogpost to inform us…

73bob

Some comments and getting OQP plans finished….

Lets get the easy things done first…

VA3QV WILL BE operating in the Ontario QSO Party from Ottawa. 

Fair weather plans are to operate from a greenspace area fairly close to my home QTH.  I will be operating on Saturday PM on 2m to 40m SSB QRP and on Sunday 2m to 80m SSB QRP

Bad weather back up plans are to operate from home (QRP SSB) on 2 to 80m depending on band conditons at the time.

As I am still down to one radio for HF… My FT817 will be the radio of choice for the event…

Antennas will be as follows:

Saturday Day- Par End Fed and dual band (2m-6m) wire dipole

Saturday Evening and foul wx setup- S9 43 foot vertical along with 6m delta loop

Sunday Day- W3EDP end fed and dual band wire dipole or foul wx setup (see above)

As you can see I am planning to give out some contacts but as its QRP you have to have a decent RCV to hear my 5w signal…  Lets see how many of you can hear it…

Now on to the coments…

Arthur…. the soggy ground would be better if it was salt marsh but…  soggy is most likely better than dry…  however with some ailments that seem to have stricken me as I increase in age my joints (knees and ankles) just to name a few prefer dry….  and a warm dry is even better…

Martin: (the RaDAR one… not the SOTA one)  Hope your RaDAR event went well…  I tried participating in the past but did not have prop conditions to South Africa (who were the only ones participating at the time).  I am looking forward to the November event when the ground is dry (cold but dry) and the leaves are off the trees making it easier to string the end fed up…

RAC in General:  Back in Jan 2013 I decided to let my membership lapse.  The only way I felt I could protest things was to hit them where it hurts (the wallet).  I have long stated that if you are not a member then you don’t have the right to bitch about how things are being done.  As I am not a member that should explain my lack of comments on the topic.  There is another blogger out there ( check my blogroll) who is taking them to task and I do agree with 99% of what he has been saying on the topic…

As a “Non Member” I did look through the RAC website with the hope of seeing some areas where there would be improvements in policy and attitudes… which might be a sign that it would be worth renewing my membership.  I am sorry to say that I am still a “Non Member”…

Getting back to “Fun Radio Stuff”….

The weekend after the OQP we also have the QRP to the field event.  You can follow the link to their website…  It would be a fun way to spend a Saturday (EDST) afternoon either as a participant or just giving out QRO contacts for the QRP operators to copy…

Check back on sometime on Monday for my expected Bragging or Excuses on the Ontario QSO Party results…

73bob

Weather STILL effecting operating….

Well yesterday according to Chris St Clair of the Weather Network:

It snowed yesterday in Canada…  All over Canada…  In every Province and Territory of Canada…  it snowed!!!

For me that means that its another day the FT 817 will not see the park…  Not only that…  The added moisture on the ground adds a couple more days that I will be not going out due to soggy ground conditions…

Remember this from last week???

So as I write this posting looking at the upcoming WX forcast…  The temps are going to take a quick rise and we are expecting temps in the “Teens” (remember we are using “C” here in Canada) which will quickly melt the remaining snow the rest of the forcast includes lots of wet.  Remember the old saying that “April Showers brings May Flowers”  we should have a great garden in May…

However this does not help the Portable Operator as I need a dry operating location to play radio from…  So far things are not looking promising for a decent showing in the Ontario QSO Party which will be happening in a week from now…  If you had asked me over the winter what my plans were for the OQP my answer (most likely) would of been to load up the Electric Vespa and head out to a good operating location where the low noise floor would make up for the QRP signal of the FT 817 and have a great time playing radio…  Even a couple of weeks ago after I realized the Vespa would still be stuck in the snow in my back yard I had hoped to get out to a local park and get a few hours operating each day to get Ottawa on the air for the contest…

I still plan to get on the air and give out contacts but now its really starting to look like it will be from home with the higher noise levels….

The weekend (Saturday in the Eastern Time Zone) after the OQP is the QRP to the Field contest and for this one a few of us are heading out to play and as there are cars involved in the tranportation picture we have a location further out that has some shelter so rain or shine we will be there…

.

KX3<———————————————->FT817

This will be a side by side comparision of the Elecraft KX3 and the Yaesu FT 817 so not only will it be fun but it will be informative…  I am expecting that any questions I had about the KX3 will be answered and my fears put to rest and …..  I’ll drink the Koolaid and end up ordering the new radio I have been procastinating about for so long…

And for those of you wondering what “Drink the Koolaid” means…  see below:

So there you have it….

A week today I will be giving out contacts in the Ontario QSO Party…  From where I give them out depends on Mother Nature…

But sooner or later…  The parks will dry out…  The temps will warm up and it will be a great time to be a  QRP Portable operator in an urban setting….  The location does not have to be rare or exotic…  It just has to be warm and dry with a low noise floor and I’ll be smiling…

For the record….  This telling you what I plan to do (compared to telling you what I did) really sucks…  I’m blaming it on the weather, but I really hoped to have lots more air time with the 817…  If I knew things were going to turn out like this I most likely would not of sold the 450 so quickly and operated more from home…  but then again as hindsight is always 20/20….  aw shucks…

Hopefully I’ll be back to bragging about contacts with my next post…

73bob

No rare DX…

… But it was lots of fun…

This morning I decided to take my FT 817 out for some fresh air.  According to my log book the last time out was in the middle of Jan 2013 so we were due…

This time the Weather was much nicer although with the warmer temps the park was a bit soggy to walk through… The ground was saturated with all the melted snow…

above- pic shows the usual picnic table I operate from and the swamp surrounding it…

below- pic shows the usual picnic table with slightly dryer ground…

Below- pic shows the Parkbench I had to operate from.  The ground was almost dry as compared to other locations in the park…

The new 2013 version of my setup…  The Mic cord for the 817 is the bright yellow cable so I can’t lose it, the tablet which looks after the DX Cluster, the Logging program is infront of the FT 817,  the VX8GR for aprs and voice cms is beside the 817 and the battery and the solar panel is behind/beside the ft 817.

And yes all of it still fits in the old red backpack shown in the upper picture…

The antenna for today was my PAR QRP End Fed… and it operated with no issues… (sloper configuration)

The first contact was made with John VA3OW  who was the NCS for the TP Net on 7.055.  He gave me an honest 5-7 report and he was a 5-9 +.  Remember I was only using 5w… These contacts are always fun as they are longer than groundwave but extremely short distance.  65 km as the crow flies but…  it shows neighboring municipalities can talk on HF without all the fancy computer linking assistance such as IRLP, ECHOLINK or DSTAR.  We did it good old fashioned HF voice…

The next contact was with Bob AA4DY/9 Brownie as he likes to be called was operating Portable 9 from Indiana… Seeing the time of the year I would of thought he would of been in 4 land where its warmer but each to their own… The contact was made during the Retired Submariners net on 14.343 and again was made with 5w at my end  The reports were 5-5 for me and 5-9 for him…

Its always good to know that the rig is working…  In addition during the 1km walk from my place to Weston Park and back various contacts were made on the VE3ORF Repeater system.  I made contacts using  the 70cm side of the linked repeaters so my APRS signal could be heard on 144.390

It felt good to get out into the park for the start of another radio season..  I will be watching the water levels closely as I hope to operate from Weston Park for the Ontario QSO Party  later this month.  However it has to be dry for that to happen…

Enjoy your week and more operating news when it happens…

73bob

News from HFPack

 The following comes to us from the HF Pack Group

————————————————————–

 

 

== HFPACK NEWS == 05 April 2013

= HF INTEROPERABILITY EXERCISE 2013 (HFIE-2013)
Start: 1200 UTC 05 April 2013
End: 2359 UTC 15 April 2013

= INVITATION TO OPERATORS FOR HF INTEROPERABILITY
All operators are invited to participate in this
annual EMCOMM readiness exercise, using ALE (Automatic
Link Establishment) and NALE (Non-Automatic Link
Establishment) Selective Calling on HF radio. Ham radio
uses the same standard system as Non-governmental and
government organizations worldwide for HF Interoperability
communications. 2G ALE Voice, Text, and Data.
More information:

http://hflink.com

= ON-THE-AIR ALE SUPPORT AND TRAINING
Use the ALE COMM CENTRE chat room for real-time map,
activity log, and support comms between ALE operators.
Free windows PCALE software is available for HF radios.

http://hflink.net

= HF INTEROPERABILITY STATION OPERATOR CERTIFICATION
Certificates are issued to stations and operators for
communications operations in the HF Interoperability Exercise.
See the previous 2012 certifications at:

http://hflink.com/HFIE2012/

= HF INTEROPERABILITY ALE FREQUENCIES
GLOBAL ALE HIGH FREQUENCY NETWORK (NETCALL= HFN)
Selective Calling – Text Messaging – Auto Sounding – Email

=
==KHZ==SSB===COMMON USE========(NOTES)===

=
03596.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING
05371.5 USB DATA ………..(Some areas)
07102.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING
10145.5 USB DATA/SOUNDING
14109.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING
18106.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING
21096.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING
24926.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING
28146.0 USB DATA/SOUNDING

INTERNATIONAL ALE SSB VOICE NET (NETCALL= HFL)
Calling – Voice QSO – Attended Sounding

-

==KHZ==SSB===COMMON USE========(NOTES)===

-
03791.0 USB VOICE-SSB
03996.0 USB VOICE-SSB…….(North America)
05371.5 USB VOICE-SSB…….(Some areas)
07185.5 USB VOICE-SSB
07296.0 USB VOICE-SSB…….(North America)
14346.0 USB VOICE-SSB
18117.5 USB VOICE-SSB
21432.5 USB VOICE-SSB
24932.0 USB VOICE-SSB
28312.5 USB VOICE-SSB

= HF INTEROPERABILITY EXERCISE IS SPONSORED BY:

HFLINK – International Resource and Forum for HF
Interoperability, Automatic Link Establishment,
and HF Emcomm. 4900 Members

http://hflink.com

HFN – Global ALE High Frequency Network (HFN)
Worldwide Net of Automatic Link Establishment Stations.
2900 Registered Stations

http://hflink.net

–
Please forward to friends and clubs, pass it on…
–

Regards,
Bonnie Crystal KQ6XA
HFPACK Webmaster

Back in the Saddle again

Well the title says it all…

After 3 weeks of fighting the “common cold” or whatever the *^&%$#$%^ it was….  I finally have my voice back…  I have been able to make a couple of DX Contacts and I am not sleeping most of the day away…  Strangest thing though….  Not in my memory has an ailment ever knocked me down for so long that did not large amounts of antibiotics involved…  I never even had a fever or anything normally associated with a bug… and I did have my flu shot this year as usual so I have to think that it was just a very stubborn common cold…

So now what did I miss…  I did try for the CQ WPX SSB Contest but my voice did not stand for any long term CQ DX stuff so I listened with envy and then just went back to watching the Television…

I did however find a logging program for my Galaxy Android Tablet that will talk nicely to my account of HRD Log .net and so I can now enter my contacts from the field in real time and they will show up immediately on my hrdlog.net account the same as when I enter them from home.

This of course means that I have to be within cell service distance of a Wind Mobile Tower but they seem to have excellent coverage in the areas that I normally operate from and due to being a long term customer I also have an excellent Data Plan and using my mobile hotspot (with my tablet connecting to it) I can have a solid 3G connect.  I am also using an APRS Program and a DX Cluster Program on the tablet and really now I have all the conviences of home when I operate in the field except for the computer controls of the actual Ham Radio Deluxe program…  Hopefully there will be an app for that in the near future…

I have heard of a blue tooth adapter that plugs into the FT817 (FT8X7 series of radios) that does allow using the tablet for controling the radio along with some excellent software but…  The adapter which is the expensive part of the package is for the Yaesu Radios only and I am still sitting on the fence on what the new rig will be …. Argonaut 6 and KX3 are still in contention to be added to the stable…. The 817 will not be leaving but used for VHF/UHF sat stuff…  I still do have my arrow sat beam and soon will be working it a lot more…

I also found a company that does some great Ham Radio apps for the android system and even built a PSK adapter so you can do PSK31 and other sound card modes from your device…  I have tried one of their apps so far and I like it so….  with any of the apps its your opinion that counts so follow up at your own risk but the link to their site is here and take a look around…

The weather has been slow to warm up this year so my attempts to head out to the parks just ain’t been happening.  I did not want to make the cold worse than it already was…  But I am hoping to get out again before the end of the month as April has several events that I wish to participate in…

RaDAR Contest (North America)

This is a Portable Operating contest working on the principals of Rapid Deployment Amateur Radio.  Its gets its origins from South Africa where they have an excellent group and is starting to work its way into North America.  However with the contest being early in April I am having my doubts if it will be warm enough for me to venture out without getting that cold back

Ontario QSO Party

I try and participate in the OQP every year and actually have gotten some good (no make that Great) wallpaper over the years.  This year I will most likely be operating from Ottawa (slight chance of Renfrew County again) and I know that it will be in the QRP Catagory.

QRP to the Field

This will be the first time I have actually participated in the QRPTTF event as its the first time they are allowing SSB to be part of the competition.  Previous years it was CW only.  I have assisted the OVQRP with their efforts in previous years (someone had to put up the antennas and do the coffee runs) but I am looking forward to showing what 5w and a loud voice can do…

So as you can see…  April should be a busy and fun month… Hopefully I will have lots to share with you after…  Perhaps even some gaps filled in my Worked All States for even better with some new ones added to my QRP DXCC efforts…

73bob

Don’t pay the ransom…

Its been a while…. and no I was not kidnapped…

If I can take you back in time to the time period  of March 14th to March 18th I was having a blast making lots of QRP SSB Contacts….  Well…

On Tuesday March 19th I went out for a walk and noticed that my throat was getting sore…. and on March 20th I really has a sore throat and started to lose my voice…  That in itself is not the best thing that can happen to a SSB operator but it did…  Now I am not sure what it was… I know it was not the FLU, so as much as I hate to admit it it seems a “Common Cold” knocked me off my feet for 8 days so far…  I am feeling better today and so I ventured down into the shack and re intoduced myself to the gear (including this computer) but the voice is not strong enough to try an break a pile up yet…

I am resting up and hoping to have enough voice to give out that rare VA3 Prefix in the CQ WPX contest this coming weekend…  Once again for a non contester like myself there is a good chance to find some stations who have a decent enough receive section to hear a QRP SSB Signal…  I’m hoping for that at least…

Hope to work you in the contest over the weekend… and hopefully after the weekend we can compare notes and see how good we did…

73bob